Latest news from Department of Health website:
Due to potential postal delays caused by the postal strikes the Department of Health will accept responses to this consultation received after 2 but not beyond 16 November 2009.
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The Department of Health consultation shuts on November 2nd. If you haven’t responded yet, please do. It would be an enormous setback for reason and common sense. In case it is any help to anyone, this is what a one said:
And ,What's your opinion?
The questionnaire
Q1: What evidence is there of harm to the public currently as a result of the activities of acupuncturists, herbalists and traditional Chinese medicine practitioners? What is its likelihood and severity?
Harm
No Harm
Unsure
Comment
Answer: Harm
Comments: unqualified or incompetent practitioners can cause harm to patients; incidents have happened in the past; Money-driven people only care about making money from the activities of these professions and put public safety in great risk. .
Q2: Would this harm be lessened by statutory regulation? If so, how?
Yes
No
Unsure
Answer: yes.
Comments: Statutory regulation (SR) can safeguard patients by disallowing unqualified/incompetent “practitioners” to practise, preventing money-driven activities. In fact, most harmful incidents happened in the past are caused by those “practitioners” and business owners due to lack of statutory regulation.
Q3: What do you envisage would be the benefit to the public, to practitioners and to businesses, associated with introducing statutory regulation?
Significant benefit
Some benefit
No benefit
Unsure
Answer: Significant benefit
Comments: Ensure practitioners to be appropriately qualified and competent; significantly reduce risks of harm to the public; prevent the unqualified from practicing; prevent money-driven activities; improve clinical efficacy.
Q4: What do you envisage would be the regulatory burden and financial costs to the public, to practitioners, and to businesses, associated with introducing statutory regulation? Are these costs justified by the benefits and are they proportionate to the risks? If so, in what way?
Justified
Not Justified
Unsure
Answer: Justifies
Comments: there will be a financial cost for statutory regulation, but the benefits will significantly overweigh the cost.
Q5: If herbal and TCM practitioners are subject to statutory regulation, should the right to prepare and commission unlicensed herbal medicines be restricted to statutorily regulated practitioners?
Yes
No
Unsure
Answer: Yes.
Comments: Statutory regulation will ensure the proper qualification and competence of the practitioners. The right of using unlicensed herbal medicines should be restricted to registered practitioners to ensure the public to access effective and safe herbal medicines
Q6: If herbal and TCM practitioners are not statutorily regulated, how (if at all) should unlicensed herbal medicines prepared or commissioned by these practitioners be regulated?
Answer: There is no option other than statutory regulation.
Comments: Only statutory regulation can ensure that practitioners are qualified and competent to use unlicensed herbal medicines. They should be the only people to be allowed by SR to use such herbal medicines. Without SR (such as current situation), harmful incidents can not be avoided and public safety can not be ensured.
Q7: What would be the effect on public, practitioners and businesses if, in order to comply with the requirements of European medicines legislation, practitioners were unable to supply manufactured unlicensed herbal medicines commissioned from a third party?
Significant effect
Some effect
No effect
Unsure
Answer: Significant effect.
Comments: it would be a disaster. Public would be denied for access to herbal medicines, practitioners would be forced to discontinue their practice and herbal medicine would be dead.
Q8: How might the risk of harm to the public be reduced other than by orthodox statutory regulation? For example by voluntary self-regulation underpinned by consumer protection legislation and by greater public awareness, by accreditation of voluntary registration bodies, or by a statutory or voluntary licensing regime?
Voluntary self-regulation
Accreditation of voluntary bodies
Statutory or voluntary licensing
Unsure
Answer: Unsure.
Comments: All the options given in this question are meant to keep the current situation, in which public safety can not be secured, risks and potential harms can not be prevented as argued in our responses to above relevant questions. The most effective way to protect public is statutory regulation.
Q9: What would you estimate would be the regulatory burden and financial costs, to the public, to practitioners and to businesses, for the alternatives to statutory regulation suggested at Question 8?
Answer: Not applicable
Comments: Statutory regulation is the most effective and efficient way. Currently, several regulatory regimes co-exist as listed in Question 8 and they cause more burden and cost to the public, practitioners and businesses, directly or indirectly. After SR, practitioners will simply pay for their registration; therefore licensing fee, cost to trading standard agents etc will be avoided.
Q10: What would you envisage would be the benefits to the public, to practitioners, and to businesses, for the alternatives to statutory regulation outlined at Question 8?
Answer: not applicable.
Comments: The alternatives to statutory regulation as described in Question 8 do not offer any benefits more than SR does to the public, practitioners and businesses.
Q11: If you feel that not all three practitioner groups justify statutory regulation, which group(s) does/do not and please give your reasons why/why not?
Acupuncture
Herbal Medicine
TCM
Unsure
Answer: None of the above
Comments: All three practitioner groups justify statutory regulation. They are interlinked with each other in a form of cross-practice. It is practically impossible to regulate one practice or one group and leave the others unregulated. A joint regulation for all three groups has been on DH agenda since 2005 and it is the right direction to keep.
Q12: Would it be helpful to the public for these practitioners to be regulated in a way which differentiates them from the regulatory regime for mainstream professions publicly perceived as having an evidence base of clinical effectiveness? If so, why? If not, why not?
Yes
No
Unsure
Answer: No.
Comments: The aim of statutory regulation is to protect public from harms caused by incompetent practitioners, it is not about evidence. The current situation has proved that without SR, public safety can not be secured as it does not prevent unqualified and incompetent practitioners causing harms to their patients.
Q13: Given the Government’s commitment to reducing the overall burden of unnecessary statutory regulation, can you suggest which areas of healthcare practice present sufficiently low risk so that they could be regulated in a different, less burdensome way or de-regulated, if a decision is made to statutorily regulate acupuncturists, herbalists and traditional Chinese medicine practitioners?
Yes
No
Unsure
Answer: No.
Comments: All three professions bear risks to the public if they are not properly regulated. We can not think of any alternatives which can offer the same level of protection as statutory regulation.
Q14: If there were to be statutory regulation, should the Health Professions Council (HPC) regulate all three professions? If not, which one(s) should the HPC not regulate?
Yes
No
Unsure
Answer: Yes.
Comments: This is a pointless question. A joint regulation under HPC for all three professions has been in the DH agenda since 2005, and it was strongly recommended in Steering Group report. We do not see the point why any of them should be regulated separately.
Q15: If there were to be statutory regulation, should the Health Professions Council or the General Pharmaceutical Council/Pharmaceutical Society of Northern Ireland regulate herbal medicine and traditional Chinese medicine practitioners?
HPC
GPC/PSNI
Unsure
Answer: HPC.
Comments: As a joint regulation, only HPC can regulate all three groups. GPC or PSNI can not regulate herbal medicine and TCM practitioners as we are practitioners, not pharmacists. We treat patients using not only herbal medicines, but acupuncture as well. The herbal medicines we use usually are tailor-made according to patient’s need; this is totally different from selling medicines to customers. It is against the basic principles to regulate herbal medicine and TCM practitioners in the same regulatory body as for pharmacists.
Q16: If neither, who should and why?
Answer: not applicable.
Comments: The first option for regulating three professions is HPC. The second option could be a joint CAM Council as recommended by DH prior to 2005.
Q17:
a) Should acupuncture be subject to a different form of regulation from that for herbalism and traditional Chinese medicine? If so, what?
Yes
No
Unsure
b) Can acupuncture be adequately regulated through local means, for example through Health and Safety legislation, Trading Standards legislation and Local Authority licensing?
Yes
No
Unsure
(a) Answer: No.
Comments: three professions should be regulated under one regulatory body. All TCM practitioners also practice acupuncture. A separate regulation will cause a lot of problems to us.
b) Can acupuncture be adequately regulated through local means, for example through Health and Safety legislation, Trading Standards legislation and Local Authority licensing?
(b) Answer: No.
Comments: All the local means mentioned here are basically the current situation which does not ensure the authority to check the qualification and does not offer and national standards for acupuncture practice. Therefore a good practice and public safety can not be guaranteed. Only a statutory regulation can offer such guarantee.
Q18.
a) Should the titles acupuncturist, herbalist and [traditional] Chinese medicine practitioner be protected?
b) If your answer is no which ones do you consider should not be legally protected?
Yes
No
Unsure
Answer: Yes.
Comments: Through title protection, unqualified “practitioners” will not be allowed to practice, public can be ensured that they receive treatment only from qualified and registered practitioners. This is best for the interest and safety of the public. For this reason, the titles of all three professions should be protected.
Q19: Should a new model of regulation be tested where it is the functions of acupuncture, herbal medicine and TCM that are protected, rather than the titles of acupuncturist, herbalist or Chinese medicine practitioner?
Yes
No
Unsure
Answer: No.
Comments: There is not any better model of regulation than statutory regulation. Ideally both title and function of the three professions should be protected. Statutory regulation can protect function through protecting title, and it is the most feasible model.
Q20: If statutory professional self-regulation is progressed, with a model of protection of title, do you agree with the proposals for “grandparenting” set out in the Pittilo report?
Yes
No
Unsure
Answer: Yes.
Comments: There should be a “Grandparenting” scheme in place when introducing a new regulation for existing practitioners to get registered in a more favorable and convenient way. However, the Pittilo report recommended a “Grandparenting” with favorable arrangement for professional qualification as minimum requirement), but not for English language competence. This is not fair to many Chinese TCM practitioners.
Q21: In the event of a decision that statutory or voluntary regulation is needed, do you agree that all practitioners should be able to achieve an English language IELTS score of 6.5 or above in order to register in the UK?
Answer: No.
Comments: We agree that for any future practitioners there should be an English language requirement such as IELTS 6.5 after the regulation takes place. However, for existing practitioners who have safely practised in the UK for more than 5 years, there must be some favorable arrangement on language. We do not understand why the “Grandparenting” recommended by Pittilo report offers favorable arrangement on anything else but not on language. We strongly urge that for existing practitioners, especially the members of those organizations that met the criteria set up by Steering Working Group for recommending to HPC for automatic registration, there should be some favorable arrangement on English language
Q22: Could practitioners demonstrate compliance with regulatory requirements and communicate effectively with regulators, the public and other healthcare professionals if they do not achieve the standard of English language competence normally required for UK registration? What additional costs would occur for both practitioners and regulatory authorities in this case?
Yes
No
Unsure
Answer: Yes.
Comments: Many TCM practitioners can still communicate effectively with their patients and other health professionals, even their English does not reach IELTS 6.5.
IELTS is a test mainly for young English language learners. Many non-native British practitioners have lived and practised in the UK for many years, their English is good enough for them to communicate with their patients, public and other health professionals, but they may never reach IELTS 6.5 as language test can be much more difficult to adults. For those with poor English competence, they have been using interpreter’s help in their practice in the past years and this should be allowed in the new regulation for these existing practitioners. The extra cost involved mainly to the practitioners themselves on interpretation service. And it can be left to the practitioners themselves to cover this cost.
Q23: What would the impact be on the public, practitioners and businesses (financial and regulatory burden) if practitioners unable to achieve an English language IELTS score of 6.5 or above are unable to register in the UK?
Significant impact
Some impact
No impact
Unsure
Answer: Significant impact
Comments: The biggest impact would be on those practitioners as they would be denied into register and as a consequence they will be disallowed to practise and will lose their livelihoods. Their job loss due to regulation could be a very serious issue and may be related to Human Right law, etc. The negative impact on the public would be that patients lose the access to their service from highly qualified and well experienced practitioners. Impact on the business and government etc is also obvious as if they have to discontinue their practice; it means unemployment, jobseeker benefit, human right issues, etc.
Q24: Are there any other matters you wish to draw to our attention?
Comments: Highlight of our responses
• Statutory regulation is our No1 choice;
• HPC is our favourite regulatory body;
• Three practitioners groups should be jointly regulation;
• Only registered practitioners should be allowed to use herbal medicines;
• Titles should be protected;
• There should be a favourable arrangement on English language for existing practitioners.
